


this isn't coping, this is making a bomb out of yourself.

by PUNK_MENACE



Category: Daredevil (TV), Deadpool - All Media Types, The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Crying, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Grief, Hurt Peter, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Past Character Death, Platonic Relationships, Suicidal Thoughts, Team Red, Whump, Whumptober 2019, a little bit of, do not copy to other sites, not super explicit though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-03
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-22 09:16:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20871824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PUNK_MENACE/pseuds/PUNK_MENACE
Summary: It's been a pretty hard year for Peter.  Everything just piles on, all the hurt blurring into a background buzz, until one day it all catches up with him.(Day 2 of Whumptober: Explosion)





	this isn't coping, this is making a bomb out of yourself.

**Author's Note:**

> tw for suicidal ideation.

To say it’s been a rough year is too far an understatement for Peter. He can’t truly sum up the soul-sucking, exhausting train of terrible events that have transpired over the last year in the word _rough._ Not even the explicit version – really, really fucking rough – carries enough weight to communicate how close Peter is to screaming every hour of every day. Unfortunately, though, Peter is still too polite to, when people ask why he looks so tired, answer with _the last twelve months have been a nauseating whirlpool of nightmarish hell on earth and I’m so sick of it I must retreat to the bathroom to have an hour-long crying-and-screaming session._

It’s a bit too long. A bit too descriptive. But it’s his truth.

At this point, he’s teetering on the edge of a breakdown almost 24/7. He’s bound to go off soon like a bomb made of tangled wires and broken glass, barely holding together as the clock counts down. If he listens closely, he may even catch the soft _tick-tock_.

These days, he’s only being held together by the little pockets of time that aren’t filled with work, school, or patrol. The only real breaks Peter has had are when he goes to hang out with Wade at Matt’s place. It doesn't fix everything but as long as he’s sprawled out on a beanbag with those two nearby, he can breathe.

Today is different. Today is too hard. She died on this day last year, and Peter can’t help but replay his last moments with her over in his mind. Falling endlessly toward the ground, reaching his hand out to her. She’s so close to him, so scared, so fragile. He remembers staring into her eyes and trying to ingrain her face into his memory so he wouldn’t forget how her lips formed a smile or how her eyes glittered when she was curious. He can still hear the thud of her body hitting the ground, the crack of her neck snapping.

“Pete?” Wade asks. “D’you want a burrito or not?”

Peter blinks, jarred out of memories. He shakes his head, trying to reconcile the fact that he isn’t in the clock tower with the very much vivid memories and emotions washing over him. Wade is talking to him and Matt is not-staring like he does when he’s listening intently and still facing somewhere else but definitely paying close attention.

“No?”

“What- uh, what was the question?” Peter rubs his eyes hard and inhales deeply. Gwen stares at him. He opens his eyes again and finds Wade and Matt facing him now. Gwen is dead. Peter isn’t. 

“I asked if you wanted a burrito or something, Petey-pie.” 

“Uh, nah. No, thanks.” God, he misses her. He misses when the four of them would hang out and Peter didn’t feel like a burden because all he could do is sleep or eat or try to laugh at whatever movie or show they’re watching. Gwen used to get along with Matt, their dry humor slotting together well. She and Wade would also poke fun at Peter together, adding on to each other until they were all crying with laughter. “Not hungry.”

At that, Matt shifts around a little on the couch. “You were patrolling for four hours before you got here,” he says in his lawyer voice. Matt always says he never uses his “lawyer voice” – always strictly accompanied by air-quotes – outside of court, but both Wade and Peter have damning evidence against him. “And you have an advanced metabolism.”

A touch of irritation adds to Peter’s headache. If he wants to skip a meal for whatever reason, he shouldn’t get nagged, especially by two fellow vigilantes with self-care routines that are, frankly, quite lacking. 

He isn’t going to argue, though. If starts trying to defend his right to not eat, Matt will certainly win against him using all sorts of logic. Matt cares about him, and Peter understands this, but he’s had bad day after bad day for a good while now and he’s out of patience.

“Leave it, please.” Hoping that’s enough, Peter snuggles deeper into the beanbag and brings his blanket up to his nose. They’re watching a random episode in the umpteenth season of a TV show that Peter can’t bring himself to care about right now. It’s a good way to avoid looking up at Wade and Matt who will undoubtedly be judging him for getting pissed at them. 

Matt’s eyes narrow, looking somewhere over Peter's shoulder. His head tilts a bit to the left. Then he gets to his feet and limps over to stand between Peter and the TV. Even though Peter doesn’t even know the names of the characters on the show, he’d still like to keep watching. His headache spikes.

“You need to eat, I don’t care how tired you are. If you pass out we’ll have to find you before someone else does and takes your mask off.” His tone is no-nonsense and only serves to make Peter angrier.

“Fuck's sake, Matt, I just want to fucking sit here and not think about- _whatever_.” Matt doesn’t move. Wade doesn’t say anything, just sits back against the couch and watches with an unreadable expression. “Please! See? I said please, I’m being polite, please just let me watch the goddamn show.” Nothing. Matt crosses his arms. Peter scoots his beanbag over but he can only catch a glimpse of the drama unfolding onscreen before Matt blocks him again. His vision is filled with the grey sweatpants and bandaged torso of one vigilante-lawyer. “Goddamnit! I’ve had a hard, long ass day. I'll eat _later_. Now could you just fucking leave me alone?”

“Eat something and I’ll let you watch." Peter cranes his neck over to the left; Matt scoots over to the left, favoring his right leg. "I can keep this up.” Matt is smirking down at him. The bastard is having fun with this.

Peter’s heart rate ramps up, anger making him breathe harder, and he feels his face flush. He gets to feet faster than Matt can blink and crowds in close. “What the hell is wrong with you? What does it matter if I don't eat? I don't need your shitty tone, and I don't need you worrying about me. It's annoying, it's always annoying!”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Yes I fucking do!” Peter thinks about Gwen, thinks about the terror in her eyes, her hands reaching up to him. He hears her die again, the resounding blow of her back hitting the floor and her bones shattering. No matter how much he doesn't want to, he thinks about her limp body bleeding in his arms. He thinks about how hard it was to get out of bed even months afterward and how it’s gotten hard again, even with Aunt May, Wade, and Matt’s help. “If I don’t have the energy to fucking eat then what does it matter if I just sit here and rot away?” Matt finally drops his smirk but it’s not as triumphant as Peter thought it would be. “I would really rather you leave me alone and stop worrying about whether I eat or not because it doesn’t fucking _matter _because she’s _gone_ and I’m still here!”

That’s it. It’s too much.

He’s gone through the stages by now. The ones everyone seems to know and seems to think spouting off to him will make him feel better. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. He’s supposed to have accepted her death by now. It’s been a year, long enough to get used to the fact that she isn’t here anymore, but it’s too much to say it out loud.

He’s so tired of missing her, which is a terrible thought. It’s not that he wants to forget her – he’d never forget Gwen, not in a million years, not in as many lifetimes. Peter just can’t stand living without her. Of course, he’s adjusted to it by now. He doesn’t think about turning to kiss her or tell her a joke, doesn’t think about telling her about his day or something funny Wade said, doesn’t think about telling her he’s so damn tired he almost wants to give up. But it’s only because he got it beaten into him at this point. Talking to her became routine until she died, and then it became routine to break down and cry so hard he throws up because he had the simple thought of kissing Gwen, and went to kiss her, and she wasn’t there, and it’s his fault.

“My fault, it’s my fault, it’s my goddamn fault, she’s dead and I can’t- I can’t hold her. I miss her so much,” Peter sobs. He sobs so hard he nearly chokes. 

Matt wraps his arms around Peter and presses him close, one hand in his scruffy hair and one rubbing up and down his back. He holds him even as Peter’s legs give out under him and they both have to kneel on the floor. He holds him even as tears and snot start dribbling down Peter’s face and he can’t think to wipe it away because, against the backdrop of his utterly devastating loss, it just doesn’t matter. Eating, showering, taking care of himself, it doesn’t matter.

He feels another pair of arms circle around him. Wade fits himself behind Peter, warm and firm. Peter clutches the sleeve of his sweatshirt. It’s never really gotten this bad. Losing Gwen had been overwhelming, but he’s spiraling for some other reason. Whatever it is, he’s drowning, and the only two people keeping him afloat are Matt and Wade.

He doesn’t stop crying for a while – long enough that he needs to move over to the couch in the middle of it because patrolling had left a lot of bruises. About halfway through Peter stopped sobbing, which is good because his chest and throat were starting to ache, but he continued crying for a good chunk of time after that. Wave after wave of tears came and went, all of them soaking into someone’s shoulder. A combination of hunger and exhaustion made it hard to concentrate on his surroundings as he broke down.

Eventually, he feels stable enough to wipe the last of the tears off his red face, eyes undoubtedly swollen. Crying only left him feeling even more tired than before. He feels like a towel that’s been wrung out for an hour, stretched out and thin. At least he doesn’t feel like curling up and dying anymore.

“Sorry I yelled,” he murmurs. “I shouldn’t have blown up at you.” His head is resting on Wade’s shoulder now. 

Wade rubs his shoulder and says, “Had to get it out somehow, Petey-pie. Don't sweat it.”

“I’m sorry I pushed you, but it was just because I knew you needed to stop bottling everything up,” Matt says.

Peter sits up fully. He doesn’t like crying in front of people that much but he doesn’t have the energy to feel embarrassed. Plus, Matt is right. He’d been suppressing a whole lot of things, probably ever since Gwen’s death. Perhaps he hadn’t noticed because he thought that feeling nothing was normal after grieving for so long. All of Peter’s frustrations had caught up with him and mixed with all sorts of other emotions he hadn’t truly allowed himself to feel. This one time hadn’t fixed it all, but it was cathartic in a way that he desperately needed.

“It’s ok. I guess I really needed this.” Peter rubs his temple. His headache hasn’t gone away. Actually, it’s only gotten worse. “M’tired. Can I sleep over?”

“Of course. You don’t have to ask.” 

“Thanks. I gotta call Aunt May then…” Peter leans his head back. He just needs to rest for a second before giving May a heads up that he isn’t coming home. He closes his eyes. Someone covers him up with a blanket. A hand starts carding through his hair.

He falls asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Come look at my [tumblr](https://captainjames-loveswriting.tumblr.com/) for updates, or if you want to request a story, or just chat about fandoms!


End file.
